Final Addiction
by sweetly-cruel
Summary: She was evil, he was only too aware of that, but he didn't really mind, because people who weren't particularly evil tended to bore him.' Sebastian reflects.


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Final Addiction

Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. Sadly, I am not a genius.

Author's Note: I love _Cruel Intentions_; I find the mechanics of the film fascinating. Sadly, I am now about to butcher it. This is a short story from Sebastian's POV, set seconds before he meets his untimely end. I don't think I quite got his 'voice' - he's quite difficult to characterise - but, oh, well. I enjoyed writing this. : ) Reviews are appreciated, positive or negative, but please be gentle; this is my first fic in the category.

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He doesn't love her, not really.

Love, he feels, is not really his forte. Well, he can understand the fascination it holds for certain people - idiotic schoolgirls with their cheeks doused in vile pink blusher and their heads in the clouds. Love is reserved for the weak, the clingy, and grown men and women who really ought to know better. It's a mildly entertaining concept and all, just not terribly realistic.

How has it come to pass, then, that he's fallen completely and utterly for Little Miss fucking Holier-Than-Thou herself?

It makes no sense to him; little ever makes sense to him. His life, he admits to himself, has been one painfully drawn-out joke; a blue movie that's enjoyable in parts but just plain laughable in others. Screwing up girls and their lives for kicks; there are worse ways to for a man to live, he supposes, but also better ones. At the end of the day, it's been little more than a blur. Sure, he can remember a few things; the sadistic delight of destroying the naïve dreams of many a stupid young girl, and a strong desire to win in all things. And Kathryn - he can remember Kathryn very clearly indeed.

But there's never really been a purpose, never really been a point to it all. There's never been anything that he can look at and say, 'That's what I'm living for.'

(Well, maybe except for his 1956 Jaguar Roadster.)

He'd like to be able to say that she's his reason, she's his purpose, but it would only be another of the risibly romantic lies he's become so adept at telling over the years. He's not denying that she's become part of him, that she means more to him than anything in aforementioned joke of a life has ever meant, but love was never going to save him. He's never believed in redemption, never been duped by those pathetic stories of the heart of a good woman rescuing the man from purgatory. He's never believed in any of it, and he doesn't plan to start now, as the life seeps out of him in pitiful dribbles.

He recalls a time when his dreams were drenched in darkness. His fantasies were painted in rich reds and blacks and purples, and were so deliciously twisted in every possible way, just as she was. She was, to him, a horribly distorted stained glass image of an angel with tangled wings. Her saccharine voice was, when out of earshot of those whose respect she needed, peppered with swearing and innuendo. The symbol of faith and chastity that dangled from her neck hid something destructive and sickening. She was evil, he was only too aware of that, but he didn't really mind, because people who weren't particularly evil tended to bore him.

He isn't quite sure when she faded from his dreams to be replaced by the girl with the flaxen hair. It either happened very gradually or very swiftly. She reminds him of blazing sunshine and apple trees - silly, maudlin things that he never cared a damn for before.

Ironic, really. Kathryn, for all her powers of manipulation, couldn't bring about the change in him that the virginal girl could. Only she could make reduce him to this sort of soppy sentimentality and make him fall for a sinless, sanctimonious, blonde thing with an unfashionable name like _Annette_.

And now - well, now, she's weeping, weeping over him like a romantic heroine from one of her beloved novels. And she's won, when it comes down to it. She's beaten him, forced him to discover parts of myself that he'd really rather have kept hidden. And, most fortunately of all, she's escaped. She won't have to spend her life with a mess of a human being like him. The bonds of love, after all, however strong, cannot withstand death.

He doesn't love her, not really.


End file.
